Inequality and Democracy

Reihan Salam says his “sense is that many on the left are bothered by the massive increase in income and wealth among the top 1 percent because they believe this threatens the democracy by giving a small handful of households outsized influence.” That’s not really what bothers me about the massive increase in economic inequality, but in response Brad Plumer rounds up the empirical evidence for the “outsized influence” thesis and it’s really quite compelling.